Face Reading Machine Can Tell If You’re Happy Or Bored

Can someone read you like a book? If you have answered in the affirmative, then our advice to you would be to steer clear of future webcams, as there is a new kind of technology that has been developed and is undergoing testing, which touts to be able to tell through your facial expressions whether you are happy, sad, bored or enthralled. With this particular technology, companies are able to figure out your reaction to online advertisements, and tweak things from there.

This form of biometric tracking will rely on a standard webcam in order to map out one’s facial expressions – with your permission, of course, before it is processed and a slew of results are shown to the client. Such technology is being used at the moment to map just how volunteers react to big budget advertising campaigns, right before they are launched, so that last minute changes can be made if required. The BBC even held an informal experiment with developer Realeyes for Radio 4’s consumer programme You & Yours, measuring the emotions of 150 Radio 4 listeners, and came up with some interesting results. The thing is, is the algorithm that interprets one’s emotion accurate enough in the long run?